Kiel's Savannah Walsdorf (14) gets a hug from her coach's son Jaxon Bushman as she is recognized for being the Raiders' first girl basketball player to join the 1,000 point club before an EWC matchup against Roncalli at Kiel High School Thursday, January 17, 2019, in Kiel, Wis. Joshua Clark/USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin Joshua Clark, Joshua Clark/USA TODAY NETWORK-W

Kiel's Savannah Walsdorf (14) is recognized for being the Raiders' first girl basketball player to join the 1,000 point club before an EWC matchup against Roncalli at Kiel High School Thursday, January 17, 2019, in Kiel, Wis. Joshua Clark/USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin Joshua Clark, Joshua Clark/USA TODAY NETWORK-W

Kiel band members do the chicken dance before a girls basketball EWC matchup against Roncalli at Kiel High School Thursday, January 17, 2019, in Kiel, Wis. Joshua Clark/USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin Joshua Clark, Joshua Clark/USA TODAY NETWORK-W

With spring fast approaching, we begin to focus on the upcoming student activities all of our community can be proud of!

The spring musical, "Little Women," will head to the stage April 11-14. This promises to be another standout performance by our students! If you remember, past shows such as “Newsies,” “Shrek” and “Big Fish” blew us away with amazing energy, singing and dancing. Please join us at the upcoming shows!

Speaking of theatrical performances, our choir and band students recently performed at the solo ensemble event in Sheboygan Falls. Kiel High School sent many soloists, along with our show choir, to “state” in April. This event will take place at UW-Oshkosh. Let’s go and support them!

Spring sports such as track and field, baseball, softball and girls' soccer have all begun practicing in anticipation of the great seasons that lie ahead. Let’s be sure to get out and see our students show off their many talents. All event dates and times can be found on our website, www.kiel.k12.wi.us.

As we look back at our winter sports, we are so proud of all of our athletes and how they competed and represented our community. Specific mention must go out to our girls’ basketball team, which made its way all the way to the sectional final game before losing a hard-fought battle to Freedom. Our wrestling team lost by 1 point (33-32 vs. Wisconsin Lutheran) as it attempted to quality for the state tournament. Our boys' basketball team also finished the season strong, before falling in the regional final game. Thank you, students and coaches, for all of your efforts as you continue to make us proud to be from the Kiel area!

Speaking of students, we continue to invite various grade levels of students and their teachers to school board meetings. So far, we have had students and teachers from grades 4, 5, 6 and 7. We will continue to invite grade levels of students to our meetings to show the community the great things that are happening in our classrooms and schools. Please join us as we welcome second-grade students and their teachers to the April 3 school board meeting.

Our strategic planning/vision teams continue to meet as we work toward expanding the trades, building community/business partnerships, increasing our higher level/college credit course offerings, expanding personalized learning and enriching our mental health services. It is exciting to see our community and staff work together on these teams to see our vision for the future come to life!

If you remember, our community passed a referendum question last April that approved the school district to spend $840,000 per year for the next 10 years for ongoing maintenance, technology and programming. We have already begun to take care of the much-needed improvements around our district and I think it is important that the community knows about these upgrades. We have completed or are in the process of completing the following projects: upgrading our HVAC systems district wide, resurfacing our parking lots, redoing the infields on our athletic fields, tiling our baseball field for proper drainage, pool repairs, locker room upgrades, roof repairs, electrical upgrades, tuckpointing and floor replacements, among others. We continue to say “thank you” to our community for allowing these upgrades to happen. If you would like more information about any of these projects, please feel free to reach out!

The athletic field renovation continues to be on track (no pun intended) to break ground in mid-May and to be completed by mid-August. The school board, along with many of our staff and community members, have worked tirelessly to make sure this project is “top notch” and something all of us can be proud of.

The final details of the performing arts center are currently being considered; this project should break ground in June, with bids going out a month or two prior to that. The outside “shell” of the performing arts center is expected to be completed by November, with the inside work being done next winter and being completed in spring 2020!

Also, through the Department of Justice grant money we received last fall, we were able to add shatter-resistant glass in all of our schools, 30 new doors and locks at the middle school, as well as additional security cameras in all buildings.

Brad Ebert(Photo: Courtesy of Kiel Area School District)

Finally, we would like to say “thank you” to Carew Concrete, Drexel Building Supply, Kiel Education Endowment Fund, Mike Muhs, Andrew Zinger, Todd Fox and the City of Kiel for their generous donations of time, supplies and/or financial resources so that a new Octoball Pit could be built for and used by the middle school students in our district. It is great to see the community come together again to make something great happen for our kids!

Please help me continue to thank our staff members, students, parents, businesses and community for all they do to ensure we offer the very best opportunities for our students!

Dr. Brad Ebert is the district administrator for the Kiel Area School District. Follow the district on Twitter: @Kielareaschools.